New Slang: Savan Takes Aim at Media-Minted Zing

Leslie Savan has always been one of my favorite sniffer dogs, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. For many years, she used her Voice column on advertising culture to root out the subtext and hypocrisy of each shiny new marketing campaign, creating a context and language for us to critique them.

In Slam Dunks and No-Brainers, she turns her sensors to language itselfthe catchphrases that percolate through the media and into our own mouths. She argues that Americans now speak with a "pop accent," using these phrases as a form of instant communion and a social equalizer, "a sign that you, too, share the up-to-date American personality." Fervently immersed in a sea of words, she occasionally loses herself (and us) in the slangtastic overdrive of wiggle room and happy campers. But for Savan, nothing in medialand comes without strings attached. She wants to know: What's the trade-off for all this zingy communication?